Every time we say that someone is "nailed" to their mother, we are probably missing the truth … if we strictly adhere to genetic inheritance. Because according to a study by the University of North Carolina (USA), mammals use more DNA transmitted by the father , although we inherit the same number of mutations – which differentiate us from other individuals – from both parents.
"It is an exceptional finding that opens the door to a new area of exploration in human genetics, " said Fernando Pardo-Manuel de Villena, director of the research, published in the journal Nature Genetics . Because, as Pardo-Manuel de Villena's team has verified, it is not the same to inherit a genetic variant from the father or the mother.
The research has been carried out with a population of mice called Collaboration Cross , the most diverse from the genetic point of view that exists in the world, comparable to that of the human genome. This makes it possible to better track common diseases, such as heart disorders or diabetes, that arise from the combined expression of hundreds or thousands of genes.
When analyzing the DNA involved in four different tissues, experts from the University of North Carolina discovered that 80% of the genes had variants that altered their expression, and that there was also an imbalance in favor of the father, in several hundred genes . “Let's imagine that a certain type of mutation is bad. If it is inherited from the mother, the gene is not expressed as much as if it is inherited from the father ”, summarized Pardo-Manuel de Villena.
